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WorkSafeBC issues new warnings about dust

Glenn Roche had an eye for safety

Remains of Lakeland Mills after the Monday night explosion that killed two on April 24, 2012.

Photograph by: David MAH
, Special to the Sun

VICTORIA — WorkSafeBC was warning sawmill operators as early as 2010 that a scattering of dust “as thin as a dime” can be enough to lead to a serious explosion.

“A layer of dust as thin as a dime dispersed throughout a room can create an explosion hazard,” read guidelines from WorkSafeBC, first issued April 27, 2010.

Despite that warning, however, WorkSafeBC has never specifically established what constitutes an unsafe level of combustible dust.

WorkSafeBC regularly monitors dust levels in all B.C. mills to guard against respiratory problems for workers. And regulations do stipulate that if combustible dust collects in a building or structure “it must be safely removed before accumulation of the dust could cause a fire or explosion.”

But nowhere does WorkSafeBC set out specific numbers for what levels of dust pose a risk of explosion.

“There’s no actual standard in the regulation on combustible dust,” WorkSafeBC vice-president Roberta Ellis said Thursday, adding the issue is very complex given risks fluctuate with temperature, ignition sources and a variety of other factors.

“That’s something we’re going to have to work on,” she said.

Ellis said as a first step, WorkSafeBC on Thursday reissued the its 2010 guidelines — which deal with the location and construction of dust collectors — and also published a new set of general guidelines regarding combustible dust.

“A dust explosion can cause catastrophic loss of life, injuries, and destruction of buildings,” said those new guidelines, which WorkSafeBC attached to an order it sent out Thursday calling for immediate cleanups at all B.C. mills.

“In many cases, employers and workers may be unaware of the potential for dust explosions, or fail to recognize the serious nature of dust explosion hazards,” the new guidelines continued.

Ellis said the new document is meant to provide immediate resources for mill operators and WorkSafeBC inspectors.

“What it’s done is pooled into one place the regulations around flammable air contaminants, the sections of the act that apply, the general requirements about safe workplaces,” she said.

“But it’s also given our officers, because these are instructions to our officers as well as to industry, some more information about our concerns regarding ventilation for flammable contaminants,” she added.

“It points them to some things they can do in terms of hazard mitigation strategies.”

Ellis said WorkSafeBC will also work with a variety of experts in the weeks and months to come to determine if new regulations are needed.

“That’s part of what we’re going to be looking at in terms of what about a standard for combustible dust?” she said.

“If our learning from these investigations, and from the stakeholders that we’re pulling together, are that a standard should be set, it would be WorkSafeBC [setting it] in the regulations.”

Ellis also said that WorkSafeBC plans to take the unusual step next week of issuing a preliminary report on the investigation into a January mill explosion in Burns Lake.

Ellis made it clear that the update will not offer any interim recommendations, or speculate on a possible cause.

Instead, Ellis said, WorkSafeBC investigators will release information on what they have ruled out in the investigation so far.

“We believe that may be of some assistance to unions and to employers in terms of at least knowing what we’re not looking at, what we’ve at the moment ruled out,” she said.

In question period Thursday, New Democratic Party deputy forest critic Bill Routley pressed the government on why the investigation has taken so long.

“Three months have passed since the Burns Lake tragedy and no finding has been publicly released. No warnings, no orders to set up safety inspections after the Burns Lake fire. Now we have the awful blast and fire at Prince George mill,” he said.

“Will this government commit to an expedited report on both the Burns Lake and Prince George mill fires, and will this government commit to long-term improved safety for millworkers?”

Minister of Labour Margaret MacDiarmid responded that WorkSafeBC is moving as swiftly as possible, and values accuracy above immediacy.

Ellis was more blunt.

“I’m not apologetic for the length of time that the investigation has taken. It’s important that we get it right,” she said.

“In the years I’ve been in this business, six months to conduct an investigation of this nature is not untoward. It can take that time to interview the, in this case 80 witnesses, to gather all the documentation, to collaborate with other authorities, to bring in the engineers, the fire experts, the combustible experts,” she added.

Ellis also said there were intense challenges just getting to the site in Burns Lake.

“This was an explosion that happened in the north of British Columbia. The mill was fairly heavily snowed under,” she said, adding that firefighters then flooded the site with thousands of gallons of water, which froze and was later covered in another layer of snow.

“A portion of the length of time around this investigation is simply being able to access the area of the mill that we needed to get into,” she said.

“There were particular areas the investigators wanted to look at and we wanted to get the debris out, get under, make sure that we were doing that in a way that wasn’t going to result in an injury or, God forbid, death to the investigators, because they have to get in there.”

On Thursday afternoon, the RCMP turned the investigation at Prince George’s Lakeland Mills over to the BC Coroners Service, saying they had determined the fire and explosion “not to be criminal in nature.”

In a news release, the RCMP said the coroners service will “continue to work closely with WorkSafeBC, the BC Safety Authority and Prince George Fire / Rescue.”

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